QUICK REVIEW: Hardcore Henry

12Apr

Howdy ladies and gents, it feels like ages since I’ve been to the cinema, I swear being in full-time work has ruined my availability for watching films in the cinema. But since I was still partly awake after work I decided to check out Hardcore Henry. Now besides some rumblings I’d heard about the film online, I’d mainly known about this film via the coverage of it on Collider Movie Talk and knew especially after that I’d have to give the film a shot. So now that I’ve seen it it’s time to pass judgement! 😀

I’m gonna call it now, this film is the best video game film ever. Period. While it has a lot to do with the way the film’s presented, the story also felt very rooted in the real of gaming with the way the certain characters were introduced, the character progression, certain story revelations and a final confrontation and everything. For people familiar with action/adventure games based in the first-person perspective they should feel right at home and will get the most enjoyment of this story. Beyond feeling like a video game story, Hardcore Henry‘s plot is just bananas. It starts out simply enough, but once the antagonist shows up and the action takes place, things just go from one to one hundred, and as the plot continued things just got stranger and more bizarre. This is a fictional tale with some interesting character-focused material at the center of things, but there’s certain major plot points towards the latter side of the film that I wasn’t too keen on and part of me felt like the film was a little longer than it needed to be, and the film could have worked better as a short film instead.

When it comes to the cast they did a good job in their roles. I really liked Sharlto Copley as Jimmy, he was crazy, magnetic and funny in this role and for me this the best performance he’s given since District 9 where he was able to act but also have fun with his role in the film too. Danila Kozlovsky was also really great as Akan, the film’s villain. I really enjoyed how eccentric, threatening and charismatic he was, and while I liked him a lot I would have liked to have seen more from him, and was it just me or did Akan remind anyone of the bad guy from Far Cry 4? Haley Bennett was beautiful and engaging as Estelle and finally Tim Roth’s appearance in this film was also awesome as well.

The presentation was pretty hardcore, for lack of better word. Visually the film was pretty intense and it was mainly because of the first-person point of view camera technique. The whole film is shot in first-person, like Henry had a GoPro camera on his head over the course of the entire film and depending on your views on found footage/first-person shooter video games you’ll either embrace it or get very sick. This film’s camera movements go from being calm to chaotic as hell with your view of events moving at crazy speeds all over the place. That being said the first-person camera movements were some of the most realistic I’ve seen in any film so far. Plus the use of action and violence just adds to the madness and fun nature of the film, and the CGI while it varied in its levels of realism, it was used very well where it was apparent. And the film score by definitely felt right, the adrenaline-fueled music definitely worked well in the film and the use of a certain famous song (which I won’t spoil) really added to this one really sweet action sequence as well.

In conclusion Hardcore Henry was a very interesting experience and while I had certain nitpicks with the story and some of the crazy camera movements, overall it is a film that I think everyone should see once. The action and ridiculous nature of the film is worth the price of admission for sure. 😀

Rating: 7.5/10 (Not perfect, but a bloody cool experience!)

So have you seen or are you going to see Hardcore Henry and if so what did you think of it? Whatever your thoughts be sure to drop them in the comment section below and I’ll see ya on the next review, laters! 😀

4 responses to “QUICK REVIEW: Hardcore Henry”

I had a feeling that this would be one of the main reactions to this film. I’ve adjusted to shaky cam and found footage material so this stuff doesn’t bother me as much. But I’m not gonna act like it didn’t get a little too chaotic towards the end.